


Hagoromo (Hang Up Your Cloak of Gold)

by Suzume



Category: Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: 65th Hunger Games, Alternate Universe - Magical Realism, Fairy Tale Retellings, Gen, Hagoromo, Original Character(s), Victors, Worldbuilding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-16
Updated: 2013-05-16
Packaged: 2017-12-12 00:49:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,303
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/805211
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Suzume/pseuds/Suzume
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Each of District Four's victors has a beautiful heavenly cloak.  Finnick doesn't know why the Capitol keeps them.</p><p>A <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hagoromo_%28play%29">hagoromo</a> story for the THG Fairy Tale Fic Challenge.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hagoromo (Hang Up Your Cloak of Gold)

         Every man and woman and child who walked the shores of District Four did so wearing his or her cloak of heavenly feathers.  Every cloak was beautiful, but no two were the same.  Some looked more like they were made of fish scales or fur than feathers.  Some were thick and some were so thin as to be almost translucent.  However, whatever their size, texture, or color, no matter how light or heavy they appeared, none weighed too much for their bearer.

         In the Capitol, these heavenly cloaks were much admired, for their mysterious beauty could not be replicated by even their most skilled designers and craftsmen or those they employed throughout the districts, and tributes from Four who came to participate in the Hunger Games were more highly favored the more fantastic and beautiful their heavenly cloaks.

         Finnick Odair had been training as a potential player in the Capitol's favorite game from the time he was quite small.  And he was still very young, he would admit that, but he was not stupid and he noticed these things, and other things yet-

         That, for instance, unlike all the other people in Four, the victors never wore their heavenly cloaks except when they were in the Capitol.  It didn't make any sense, particularly because he knew that among them were some of the loveliest of all.  His childhood memory of Theo Goff being crowned victor focused inordinately on the last victor's gleaming blue and green peacock-like feathers, his perfectly white smile, and the nest-like weave of multicolored metal strips that made up the crown they gave him.

         For all the big Capitol events, the victors put their cloaks back on.  Finnick had noted this carefully as he watched the overblown fuss that surrounded the Sixty-Fourth Annual Hunger Games.  Back home, Tyde paced and Shad fussed over the remaining Special Athletics Club members, neither of them donning their cloaks at any time.  They remained their plain, sad selves, fluttering amidst the dozen adorned young people watching the Games together.  Theo and Song, when he saw them, were similarly plucked of any trace of their feathers.  But onscreen with their tributes, two bright and hopeful volunteers, Odysseus' slick feathers were long and black as night and thick as fur and Mags' were small and overlapped like scales, silvering with age where once they had been gold and brown, though traces of the original hues still remained.  Though certain other victors and tributes were not without their charms, Finnick could hardly fathom how any could be visually preferred to the ones who had come from Four.

         But whether or not Marisol and Tripp were loved by the Capitol, in the end, they were not lucky or loved enough.

         They came home with their cloaks covering them.  Mags and Odysseus came home typically bare.

         There were no presents or prizes.  Instead of Tripp or Marisol a blond boy from One wore the crown.  There would be months of training again- this would've happened even with a victor, but that would've made most of it cheerier.  The months of swimming and running and rowing and fishing, of knots and nets and lines.

         Finnick would be fourteen by the time of the next reaping.  This was younger than the victors would be considering as a tribute candidate.  When they looked for the best boy, they would be thinking more of Miwo, of Taz, of Juan Carlo.  They didn't pick and push anyone forward, but each candidate knew what they had been training all these years for, of why they had trained more than others- had come past physical education class to the Special Athletics Club.

         Finnick was curious and clever.  He had spied last year on Tyde when he approached Tripp.  Tyde had listed for Tripp what they saw as his many strengths.  How they thought he was best suited out of all the boys in the club.  How they hoped he would volunteer.  Tripp's face had lit up.  He'd been happy for it.  Finnick could tell he would do what they wanted.  He would volunteer.  Tripp had been seventeen.  There were sixteen-year-old volunteers too, sometimes.  They wouldn't suggest Finnick at fourteen, but if the candidate were more reticent, would it be possible, he wondered, to speak up faster than him and supersede his claim?

         Mags was the only alternative.  How long had everyone in Four listened to the things she said?  As long as Finnick had been alive and certainly longer.  If it hurt her to go most of the year without her heavenly cloak for most years, then he wasn't able to notice it.

         In any case, Mags was wise and thoughtful and seemed to hold a preference for him, as slight as she strove to make it.  Though Finnick would not have wanted to brag outright about these things, with his frequent smiles, his effortless grace, and his glistening golden cloak, he knew he was easy to like.  Even if his parents and cohorts and teachers didn't single him out as their favorite, he was the sort of boy many people were drawn to and wished to treat well.

         It would play well in the Capitol too, he was certain.  At least one fourteen year old had won before.  He knew before because Mags had said so.  He hadn't seen it, but it had been a very long time ago, when Mags was a girl and newly victorious, so the woman would have to be nearly as old as Mags and her youthful not obvious.

         Tyde (only the very respectful boys and girls called him "Mr. Barrow," though all of them, at times, called him "Coach") was the victor who did most of the training.  Shad and Odysseus assisted.  Theo and Song were busier and mostly stayed away.  But Mags was the official head advisor of the club.  She was the one who had mentored Tyde and Odysseus and Theo (and Jules, who had died, so they usually didn't talk about him) and taught them how to mentor in turn, not to mention many other also-rans, the second and third and fourth places that Four was known for- that excited in the Capitol, but brought only bitter dreams of what might have been back to Four.

         The four older victors made their selections together, but Finnick hardly thought it counted as a secret that Mags' opinion weighed more than the others'.  Whatever it was that she liked about him especially, perhaps he could appeal to that.

 

         He drew his heavenly cloak close on a windy day when he saw her walking along the shore.  His steps were more like strides, while hers, though steady, were small.  She carried a driftwood walking stick, though she scarcely leaned upon it.  Her birthday had been marked not long ago, as it always was by her fellow victors.  He had come with the club this time, though he had come before due to family-friend connections.  She had told him once about a Great-Aunt Irene he would've had who had been a tribute.  That had been before her Games.  Mags was newly seventy.

         He caught up to her with the waves disguising the speed of his arrival.  It was evening and an early moon could be glimpsed among the clouds.  His mother might scold him later for being late to supper, but this was an opportunity not to be missed.  It wouldn't be the same if he couldn't speak with her alone and she was frequently in the company of others- fellow elders, fellow victors, the other members of the club.  People were still feeling too bad for her to let her be alone too much.  The man all the kids had called "Mr. Mags" hadn't been dead for two years yet.  Some people thought that was what had done it in for Kohaku Ayu.  Mags had gotten the bad news during the Sixty-Third Games, the very day Kohaku had reached the final four.

         "Hi Mags!" Finnick called against the wind, "Where are you going?"

         "Hello Finnick," she turned and acknowledged him, "Nowhere in particular.  I'm only walking."

         He fell in alongside her and let his cloak swing looser, to shelter her a bit from the cool breeze.  It seemed like the polite thing to do.  He had seen Mr. Mags (Mr. Ortiz, properly, or just 'Lito if you helped out in his boat shop) do this very same thing.

         The look she gave him was interesting.  She knew that he knew.  "You know, I always wondered how he could love someone like me," she mused.

         Was this some sort of test?  Finnick stayed quiet, unsure why she would mention it to him.

         "It was after my Games that he first told me he liked me."

         "Were you married for a long time then?"  There were a lot of weddings after the Games, following a lot of proposals after the reapings.  This was probably just a victors' version of that.

         "We weren't ever," she answered.  She didn't seem offended.  "You're hardly the only one who didn't realize."

         He didn't know what to say to that either, but she kept walking, so Finnick followed.

         "Someday, I'm sure you'll understand…the things you'll do to protect the people you love."

         "Yeah," he burst out, sensing an opening (everyone knew she had volunteered for another girl- Mrs. Surfjan now- someone who cared so much about other people would relate), "I think I understand that a bit!"

         It set Mags to laughing.  "Yes," she agreed, "I think you're a quicker study than me."

         She was honest with him; he would be the same with her.  "I was hoping I could volunteer as tribute in the next Hunger Games."

         The moment that stretched out between them after these words seemed very quiet despite the sounds of the wind and the waves and the sand they shifted.

         "You know, Finnick," Mags said at last, "Just because you're capable of doing something doesn't mean you should."

         She wasn't angry.  She seemed a bit sad.  He tried to grasp at her intentions.  "You mean I should wait," he guessed, "Like Tyde."  They all knew that about Tyde.  He had born so close to Reaping Day he went to the Games at nearly nineteen.  Mags had asked him to wait, to hold onto every advantage circumstance had given him.

         "Perhaps," she sighed.

         It didn't make sense.  Finnick dug his toes into the cool sand.  "…You've told me that I'm good.  That you liked me.  Don't you want me to volunteer?" his voice strained high at the end of his question with undesired anxiety.  Rarely was it suggested that a member of the Special Athletics Club not volunteer.  Usually everyone was glad that there was someone who wanted to do it.  Being told not to volunteer indicated that one or more of the victors saw a large potential problem.  Something about you, even if it were completely outside your control, meant that you would face odds worse than usual.  The only tribute Finnick had ever seen volunteer against the victors' advice had died the first day.

         "It's not quite that," her sigh was even heavier now.  She reached out to touch his golden feathers, his sun-highlighted hair.  "It's a selfish thing."

         If there was nothing wrong with him, perhaps he shouldn't press the point.  "You look tired, Ms. Mags.  You want me to walk you home?"  A part of him whirred with new calculations.  Could he convince one of the other victors?  Appeal to Tyde's 'may the best man win' spirit of fair play and competition?  To Shad's gentle sentimentalism?  To Odysseus' odds-watching pragmatism?

         She grew stronger again, somehow.  "You remind me of someone I loved," she said, "And I don't want to see you walk the same path as him."

         "A tribute who died?" came his tenuous guess.

         "A tribute who won," was her firm answer.  "But, yes," she softened again, "Let's walk home."

         She allowed him to take her arm and along the way they spoke of only ordinary things.  Finnick couldn't tell who she meant- if he somehow resembled Tyde or Shad or Odysseus or any of the others in Mags' eyes (he couldn't see himself as being much like any of them)- but it did mean one important thing.  It didn't make him invincible, but even at this age, Mags saw him as someone who could win.  It was not the endorsement, but it was still a powerful signal.

         Mrs. Surfjan was waiting at Mags' house when they got there.  She gave them both tea and as soon as Finnick had finished, swatted him with her mockingjay-like feathers, and sent him packing home.

         Finnick swore that he'd never understand old women and their whims.

 

 

         Finnick chose not to seek the special approval of his other possible mentors as the months passed and the Sixty-Fifth Games drew near.  Somehow he knew that this was meant to be his year.  That if he volunteered, Mags would not step up to block it.

         On Reaping Day, Mags took her seat onstage, front and center amidst the two neat rows the six living victors made.  Her eyes found himself easily and Finnick's heart beat fast.  Did she know what he was about to do?  Was she subtly willing him not to do it?

         For the girls, the sickly Connie Jaspick from the year above him was called and Niemi Ray, the suggested female tribute, proudly volunteered.  Things played best for the cameras with moments like these.  Niemi was more heroic in place of a wan, trembling fifteen year old than another girl her own age.  Her coral-colored cloak fluttered its arms like a sea anemone.

         Finnick couldn't hope for something to equal that, but his mere act of volunteering would create its own stir.  He tried not to give himself away with a bristling of his feathers as he readied to be the first to cry out.

         He barely heard the name before the words had left his lips: "I volunteer!"

 

 

         He had been right about Mags, that she didn't block the decision (though his worried mother and father didn't even seem to think that she could've).  Finnick was whisked off to the Capitol with Mags as his mentor.  Shad Atwater came for Niemi.

         The victor-mentors received their heavenly cloaks back upon arrival at the Training Center.  They were laid out on a table and pinned to each was a single white rose and a hand-lettered card: "Compliments of President Snow."

 

 

         Though they didn't have feathers, Finnick learned that the other districts were not so different from Four, as the other tributes also had desirable attributes the people of the Capitol were lacking and their victors, similarly, did not bring these things home with them between Games.

         It was something to note, but nothing that would change the way that Finnick played the Games.  He was confident in his own abilities.  Everyone in the Capitol seemed to be falling over themselves to fawn over his golden cloak of feathers, his bronzed skin, his bright green eyes.  If he put his all into it, their money would help to pave his way to victory.  The only taboo imposed by Mags and Shad was going out of his way to hurt Niemi, but the equal and opposite commandment had also been put to her.

         "Somehow," Niemi said to him with puzzled wonder, watching the interviews replayed on television, "Everyone loves you, Finnick."

         "It's not that they don't like you though," Shad spoke up.

         "I don't know why," Finnick shrugged.

         But Mags knew.  "He's a natural," she said.  Was Niemi reassured by her next words?  "Sometimes that's not enough."

 

 

         Was it enough?

         The trident he received was a perfect match for his heavenly cloak of beautiful golden feathers.

         It was debatable whether there was much natural about the things he did with it.

         He dove into the water one last time before he was taken from the arena- he was in much better shape than many victors when their winning moment came- and washed most of the blood from his trident, cloak, and hands.

         "Did you think he could do it?" the interviewers asked Mags.

         "Yes," she said each time, "Yes, I knew."

         It wasn't until she and Finnick were reunited that she cried.

         It didn't seem to be as bad as Mags' words on that windy beach had worried him it would be.  There had been the killing, but he had expected that part.  He hadn't felt close enough to any of the other tributes to feel betrayed.  Niemi had died- her heavenly cloak, limp now, devoid of the bursts of energy with which she had once animated it, lay over her coffin, which he saw only briefly- but he hadn't been directly related to that.

         Maybe the fact that he didn't feel all that badly about it, just numb, was a bad sign.  Mags said she had felt much the same after her own Games.

         She was pretty, he thought, with her feathers on.  She held him and he pressed his cheek into their soft caress.

         Maybe the victor he reminded her of was herself.

 

 

         The interest, adoration, and admiration that Finnick had received prior to his victory paled in comparison to what came his way afterward.  He was the toast of the town, surrounded by rich and important people, many of whom seemed ready to all but fight for scraps of his attention.

         None of these people wore heavenly cloaks, and nothing else compared no matter what pretty things they adorned themselves with.  Though just like he had learned from the other tributes, there were special things that marked the other victors, though he would have been harder pressed to properly describe them than the cloaks that he was used to.

        

 

         President Snow wore the most elaborate cloak replica of all, white and flowing, like he was wearing a garden of his emblematic roses.

         Before him, Shad trembled, but Finnick knew that Shad wore his weakness on his sleeve.

         When Mags dropped her eyes to the floor, then Finnick knew there was truly something here to fear.

         "I expect great things from you, young Odair," the president said, the smallest curve of a smile (a smirk?) curling the edges of his lips.

         "Yes, sir," Finnick said, because what else was there to say?

         "Now, before you go, I believe all of you have something to give me?"

         Shad's heavenly cloak was already loosened and in his arms, ready to be given over to one of Snow's silent footmen.

         "Why?" Finnick asked, hesitant.

         "As a symbol," Snow explained, "Of your obedience."

         Finnick held his ground.

         "As a sign," Snow elaborated further, exposing the grasping talons of his control, already hooked in so many, "That you belong to me."  He held out his hand and the footman proffered him Shad's spotted and sparrow brown cloak.  Snow pulled the material taunt and as a tiny tear appeared, Shad clutched at his chest and fell to his knees.  Tears welled up in his mismatched eyes and Mags dropped down protectively beside him.

         Snow loosened his handle on the cloak and Shad seemed free to breath again.  He coughed and Mags rubbed his back.

         "A smart young man like you should be quick to see that the only freedom you will have is that that I allow you.  So, Ms. Gaudet, Mr. Odair, if you please?"

         The first footman took back Shad's cloak.  A second accepted Mags'.

         It was only after a long moment of unwillingness, followed by finally meeting Mags' solemn gaze, which told him of the uselessness of disobeying this command, that Finnick unfastened his heavenly cloak.  His golden feathers had never felt so heavy as they did when they left his fingertips, ripped casually away by the pale, aged hands of President Snow.


End file.
